However, the other great king was determined to have her
for his wife, if he abolished all the rest, and for this reason he had
caught and kept the lost Englishman as a medicine-man; and it was not
likely that he would kill him, until he failed or succeeded.
To further enquiries Bandeliah answered that to rescue the prisoner was
impossible. If it had been his own newest wife, he would not push out a
toe for her. The great king Golo lived up in high places that overlooked
the ground, as he would these white men, and his armies went like wind
and spread like fire. None of his warriors ate white man's flesh; they
were afraid it would make them cowardly.
A brave heart is generally tender in the middle, to make up for being so
firm outside, even as the Durian fruit is. Captain Southcombe had walked
the poop-deck of the Gwalior many a time, in the cool of the night, with
Erle Twemlow for his companion, and had taken a very warm liking to him.
So that when the survivors of the regiment were landed at Portsmouth,
this brave sailor travelled at his own cost to Springhaven, and told
the Rector the whole sad story, making it clear to him beyond all doubt,
that nothing whatever could be done to rescue the poor young man from
those savages, or even to ascertain his fate. For the Quackwas were an
inland tribe, inhabiting vast regions wholly unknown to any European,
and believed to extend to some mighty rivers, and lakes resembling
inland seas.
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